Let me begin with a little background.  I am an ordained minister.  I felt God’s call upon my life when I was 17 years old to enter into vocational ministry.  I pursued that path by earning a Bachelor’s of Arts degree with a major in Bible.  I then entered seminary and earned a Master of Divinity degree, all with the goal of pursuing vocational ministry.  Later on in my career, I did advanced studies in the Doctor of Ministry program.

I start with all that to say that not only have I been to church, and understand how church works, but I have also have done formalized post graduate studies in the church.  I have also attended a lot of different types of churches, and denominations.  There have been those experiences that have stood out.  There have also been other situations that have blurred into backdrop of similarity.  But nothing prepared me for the experience that we had as we visited Cross Roads Cowboy Church in Bon Aqua, TN.

I had heard of Cowboy Churches.  I had heard tales of corrals that housed barrel racing, passing the cowboy hat for the offering, and even jails in the lobby for a sense of fun (if you get locked in jail, you have to quote a Bible memory verse as your bail).  But still, what does it look and feel like?  And, would a city slicker like me fit in to a cowboy church?  Not only do I not know how to ride a horse, I can’t run a tractor – I can’t even ride my lawn mower!  I have a cowboy hat, but it is more a prop than an actual fashion item.

After several twists and turns through the country, we found the entrance to the church, an arch near the county road.  Through that arch, we twisted and turned on the gravel road, and topped a hill, and finally the red roof of the barn / church came into view.  We walked in, and were warmly greeted.  We began to look for seats, and my cousin spotted us (Glen Chavers and his wife Dianna are planting pastors of the church), to which he put down his guitar and came down and gave us a hug.  Dianna made us a place to sit with the band, and shortly, an announcement came over the speakers that it is time for worship.  People kept milling around and talking.  Even the people on the stage continued their conversations.  And then they played Shake, Shake, Shake – not really country, and a gentleman with a wireless headset started clapping his hands and trying to get every one else to join in.  There were no printed programs, nothing formal at all.  Dare I say, there was nothing comparable to the vast experience of church that I had come to expect.

Announcement time was chaotic.  Music was chaotic (I play guitar at Church at Rock Creek, and we have custom molded earbuds, with a metronome clicking in and clicking out each and every song, to which we start and stop with crisp precision).  But I soon figured out that the chaos is what makes this church unique.  The speaker for the morning (more about that shortly), described the church as a house church, and I appreciate that analogy, because it is an accurate picture.  When family gathers, there are no programs.  Often a family gathering has an agenda, like a meal, or doing an event together, but there are no start and stop times.  It just flows.  And that is exactly what it was like at Cross Roads.

It was announced that the altar is always open throughout the service, and everyone is welcome and encouraged to kneel and pray to God at that Holy spot.  As I saw people get up and go to the altar all through the music portion of the service, they were followed, surrounded, and prayed over.  If a man goes forward, men gathered with him.  If there was a woman, then women gathered.  No one went to the altar alone.  It was a community who cared for one another.  BTW, there is one more thing that is unique about Cross Roads – this church has more men than women, and the men were very much involved in the church.  I dare you to find that at other churches in America.  It is definitely a rarity!

Then it was prayer and praise time, where men walked throughout the congregation with a wireless microphone, and got the people to share praises and prayer requests.  I expected the calls to prayer for sickness.  That seems to dominate prayer requests in Christians. Then there came requests for jobs, relationships, home searches, personal faithfulness, and much more.  One young man who has had a troubled past shared that he was looking to return to his father, and re-establish a relationship with him, because he wants his father to become a Christian.  But then there were the praises.  Again, health, finances, jobs, relationships – but then a woman said, “I praise God that my son is in jail.  He can’t get drugs, and he can’t steal from family and friends any longer.”  I heard the pain in her voice, but also the relief that her son had been stopped.  Each time, the people who shared were surrounded by people who hugged them and prayed for them.

I was done at that point – overwhelmed by the power of the Holy Spirit in that place.  They announced the preacher and he was welcomed with the Beatles playing through the speakers (what???).  There was communion, and, yes, they passed the hat.  It was overload.  My spiritual systems became that cup that overflowed.  But the ministry of the word and the ministry of communion were lost on me because I was still swimming in the deep end of the pool of prayer and praise time.

They are out of seats (they have a capacity of about 250).  It is a great problem to have, but it is still a problem.  The church consultant in me (ahem) says that they are going to have to add another service, but to do so, things are going to have to be streamlined some to move people in and out, but to do so forces them to loose some of the stuff that makes them unique.

So I ask all of my friends of faith to pray for Cross Road Cowboy Church as they continue to be Jesus to central Tennessee.